


Therese

by thisismybrainrain



Category: Carol (2015)
Genre: Carol POV, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-27
Updated: 2015-12-27
Packaged: 2018-05-09 15:23:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5545046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisismybrainrain/pseuds/thisismybrainrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>carol ponders her journey with therese & how best to say therese's name</p>
            </blockquote>





	Therese

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sarah_dude](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarah_dude/gifts).



‘I pour this all out to you.’ – p.274, price of salt

The first time you see Therese she’s behind a counter. She’s wearing a Santa hat. When she laughs there are dimples showing in her cheeks. Her eyes are so bright. They hold a fire. You want to feel her touch aflame against your skin. From that very first moment you are so gone.

You feel her body heat as you lean forward on the counter writing your details on the pad.

She smells good. Better than you’d expected.

You won’t place it till months later when you watch her apply her perfume, half out of bed and half into her clothes, your lipstick still smudged across the base of her neck.

You do not know why really, but in that moment at the counter, you make a conscious decision to leave your gloves. You wonder if she’ll take the hint.

Your phone rings later that evening and you’re giddy. You feel years younger. So full of hope.

At your dressing table mirror that night, your tartan bed clothes soft against your freshly bathed skin, you roll her name over your tongue for the first time.

 

Therese.

She sounds like some goddess, angel girl.

Maybe she is.

Maybe she’s here to guide you to something.

There is a course. There always is with women. For you, at least.

 

You’d tried to ignore it. For years, it had been archived away. They’d put you away. They’d arrest you. They’d take away Rindy. 

When she rings. You take a breath, pick up the receiver and you leap, hoping by some blind chance, she catches you before you crack and the truth pours out.

-

When you write her the first letter, you know she is strong. You know you must let her go. You know you both need it.

It does not make it any easier.

Does not stop your hand reaching into an empty space at night.

Does not stop you driving to the next Waterloo, finding the first double suite and sleeping alone with the record she gave you on repeat.

-

You’ve come full circle.

You’re writing to her again, asking to meet up and hoping again that she catches you but this time you’re ready, you’re ready to crack to pour all of it if she wants you still - if she’ll listen. Listen, like those nights in all of the Waterloos on the road.

She meets you.

You feel the flush creep up your face. Three words rush out of you.

 

The ones you came here to say. They tumble out into the air, suspended between you. She looks at you. You cannot read her. She is an exhale and then, there’s a man shouting her name. You imagine the words thudding to the white cloth.

It sounds so harsh from his lips. Therese. His mouth does not do the cadence of her justice. You want to gather all of the sunsets for her because that is what she is. The scorch marks on your soul, you and burn and burn until you light the cigarette and your hands cease their shaking.

She is flickering in the flame and you are caught in the light of her.

You watch her chatting to the man.

You take in the slope of her neck. You want her. You want her. You want her. It would be uncouth to vault over the table in a public place and you do not know what she wants yet.

 

You leave.

 

She leaves.

 

-

Years later you’ll laugh about that moment on some lazy Sunday morning her hands threading though your hair. Brunch is forgotten on the table.

You whisper her name and she leans down to kiss you with crumbs still at the corner of her mouth. You brush them away. Repeating her name, Therese. She scratches the base of your skull and nuzzles her nose against you, 'What?' She asks.

 

You smile, ‘Darling, I’m trying to get your name right.’

 

‘Carol, you know my name,’ she says.

 

‘Therese, your name is my favourite sunset,’ you say.

She smiles and smiles and smiles.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you to patricia highsmith & all behind the film adaptation  
> thank you to sarah
> 
> come find me at thisismybrainrain to cry about the price of salt with me.


End file.
